I just received the latest issue of Kitplanes (May 2009) and to my surprise, there are a couple of articles on alternative aircraft engines. I read the first one by Larry Simpson, which describes his building experiences with a RV-7A. He and his wife spent four years building and engineering the installation of a Eggenfellner Subaru H6 engine.
His first flight "lasted a total of 17 seconds, and the second half of it was unpowered. A basic electrical design flaw that was entirely my responsibility resulted from my miscalculating the power requirements of the Subaru engine computer during sustained full-power operation. A critical circuit breaker popped just as I passed about 80 feet. A long runway and lots of dead-stick practice as a glider pilot made this practically a non-event."
In my opinion this particular alternative aircraft engine installation, despite the builders' skill and dedication does not have any of the qualities that I desire. It doesn't appear to be any cheaper than a conventional Lycoming IO-360. The reliability of the custom firewall forward is unproven and it seems to weigh quite a bit more than a conventional Lycoming installation. When I consider all the time and effort that went into alternative engine, I wonder why anyone would do this? I suspect the builders could have been flying a proven engine two years sooner with a lighter plane and a heavier wallet. I admire their dedication, but I think life is too short for people to spend doing one-off installations of alternative engines that are not significantly cheaper than conventional aircraft engines.
I believe that the VW and Corvair conversions offer what I am looking for - significant savings, demonstrated reliability (100's to 1000's of installations) with available firewall forward packages. Of course, these engines are limited to 70 hp for the VW and 100 for the Corvair. I'll have to content myself with finding a small plane that can be powered by one of these.
Thursday, March 26, 2009
Wednesday, March 25, 2009
There is No Such Thing as Nuclear Waste
A friend of mine recently gave me a copy of an article from the Wall Street Journal, by William Tucker, entitled There is No Such Thing as Nuclear Waste. It was excellent. You can access the entire article here http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123690627522614525.html. Here is one of the gems that it contains, "Ninety-five percent of a spent fuel rod is plain old U-238, the nonfissionable variety that exists in granite tabletops, stone buildings and the coal burned in coal plants to generate electricity. Uranium-238 is 1% of the earth's crust. It could be put right back in the ground where it came from."
Mr. Tucker has written a book entitled "Terrestrial Energy: How Nuclear Power Will Lead the Green Revolution and End America's Long Energy Odyssey". I hope that his book is as good as his editorial in the WSJ!
Mr. Tucker has written a book entitled "Terrestrial Energy: How Nuclear Power Will Lead the Green Revolution and End America's Long Energy Odyssey". I hope that his book is as good as his editorial in the WSJ!
Monday, March 2, 2009
Stupid chain e-mail
Recently, a well meaning relative sent me a stupid e-mail. (Actually she sends a lot of them. No, it's not my Mom!) The subject of the e-mail made me so mad that I wrote the following response. After my response, I will include the text of the e-mail for your reading pleasure.
My response:
Let’s start with Truman and put to rest this colossally bad idea. He is the only person in history to order not one, but two nuclear attacks against civilians (that’s what Hiroshima and Nagasaki were/are – cities - civilization – civil - civilians). He was also complicit in the illegal, unconstitutional, immoral and extrajudicial detention and internment of innocent American citizens of Japanese descent. He was and remains an immoral midget and any argument that he did something and we should follow his example is morally bankrupt.
Secondly, I seriously doubt that the job demographics of undocumented aliens and Iraq and Afghanistan veterans overlaps to any significant extent.
Next, let’s leave aside the moral ramifications of this proposed deportation for a moment to discuss some of the other side effects.
The results would be rather predictable. The hideous violence necessary to repatriate these people – tearing them from their families, children, homes, communities, lives, jobs, businesses, etc., would bring down the governments of California, Nevada, Utah, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, and perhaps Wyoming, Idaho, New Jersey and New York. The government of Mexico would be overthrown if it did nothing to intervene and who knows but what the narcos would take complete control in the DF. The accelerated destruction of the Bill of Rights (even beyond Dubya and his gulag of torture) necessary in identifying these undocumented aliens could also lead to full blown civil war in the rest of the United States. Neighbors would become snitches, perhaps thinking they might get some of the possessions left behind by the deportees. Could pogroms be far behind?
And if the US somehow accomplished this deportation? What will it have achieved beyond the Hitleresque crimes themselves? Will the United States be prosperous and free again? Will the disturbed Iraq and Afghanistan veterans be employed in construction, landscaping, domestic help, and fast food industries? Or will they inhabit the homeless shelters like their colleagues still do from the Vietnam war?
What are you really trying to do by deporting 12 million people? What is the objective? To give jobs to returning veterans? A lot of them are going to need medical and psychiatric care for the rest of their lives – forget about jobs for these veterans. With luck, a large part of the rest of them will be able to integrate into peaceful society. If your objective is for these veterans to have jobs, try the following ideas that don’t involve violence. Eliminate capital gains tax, eliminate income taxes on new business (and old businesses, for that matter), slash the red tape involved with starting new businesses, don’t bailout another single bank, deregulate business, freeze the money supply, etc.
In short, let the money and the people be free from government manipulation! Entrepreneurs will then create jobs for returning veterans and everyone else besides and without violent revolutions at home and abroad.
This was the stupid e-mail:
This is something to think about. Consider the loss of jobs right now and` the cost to you, the tax payer. Then ask why would we keep them here illegally. The new president says he will bring home all the troops from the Middle East , where will they work, there are little jobs now?
THREE PRESIDENTS
The people that are in Washington , tell us they can not deport 12 million illegals! We` probably need to vote all of them out of office and send them back to school to learn history! We pay more to illegals in welfare than it would cost to deport them! Our career politicians need to work for the voters and the good of the United States of America , not the lobbyist and big business.
HOOVER , TRUMAN AND EISENHOWER Here is something that should be of great interest for you to pass around. I didn't know of this until it was pointed out to me. But, back during The Great Depression, President Herbert Hoover ordered the deportation of ALL illegal aliens in order to make jobs available to American citizens that desperately needed work. Harry Truman deported over two million Illegal's after WWII to create jobs for returning veterans. And then again in 1954, President Dwight Eisenhower deported 4 million Mexican nationals! The program was called 'Operation Wetback' so that American WWII and Korean veterans had a better chance at jobs. It took 2 Years, but they deported them! Now, if they could deport the illegals back then, they can sure do it today!!
If you have doubts about the veracity of this information, enter Operation Wetback into your favorite search engine and confirm it for yourself.
Reminder. Don't forget to pay your taxes... 12 million Illegal Aliens are depending on` you.
My response:
Let’s start with Truman and put to rest this colossally bad idea. He is the only person in history to order not one, but two nuclear attacks against civilians (that’s what Hiroshima and Nagasaki were/are – cities - civilization – civil - civilians). He was also complicit in the illegal, unconstitutional, immoral and extrajudicial detention and internment of innocent American citizens of Japanese descent. He was and remains an immoral midget and any argument that he did something and we should follow his example is morally bankrupt.
Secondly, I seriously doubt that the job demographics of undocumented aliens and Iraq and Afghanistan veterans overlaps to any significant extent.
Next, let’s leave aside the moral ramifications of this proposed deportation for a moment to discuss some of the other side effects.
The results would be rather predictable. The hideous violence necessary to repatriate these people – tearing them from their families, children, homes, communities, lives, jobs, businesses, etc., would bring down the governments of California, Nevada, Utah, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, and perhaps Wyoming, Idaho, New Jersey and New York. The government of Mexico would be overthrown if it did nothing to intervene and who knows but what the narcos would take complete control in the DF. The accelerated destruction of the Bill of Rights (even beyond Dubya and his gulag of torture) necessary in identifying these undocumented aliens could also lead to full blown civil war in the rest of the United States. Neighbors would become snitches, perhaps thinking they might get some of the possessions left behind by the deportees. Could pogroms be far behind?
And if the US somehow accomplished this deportation? What will it have achieved beyond the Hitleresque crimes themselves? Will the United States be prosperous and free again? Will the disturbed Iraq and Afghanistan veterans be employed in construction, landscaping, domestic help, and fast food industries? Or will they inhabit the homeless shelters like their colleagues still do from the Vietnam war?
What are you really trying to do by deporting 12 million people? What is the objective? To give jobs to returning veterans? A lot of them are going to need medical and psychiatric care for the rest of their lives – forget about jobs for these veterans. With luck, a large part of the rest of them will be able to integrate into peaceful society. If your objective is for these veterans to have jobs, try the following ideas that don’t involve violence. Eliminate capital gains tax, eliminate income taxes on new business (and old businesses, for that matter), slash the red tape involved with starting new businesses, don’t bailout another single bank, deregulate business, freeze the money supply, etc.
In short, let the money and the people be free from government manipulation! Entrepreneurs will then create jobs for returning veterans and everyone else besides and without violent revolutions at home and abroad.
This was the stupid e-mail:
This is something to think about. Consider the loss of jobs right now and` the cost to you, the tax payer. Then ask why would we keep them here illegally. The new president says he will bring home all the troops from the Middle East , where will they work, there are little jobs now?
THREE PRESIDENTS
The people that are in Washington , tell us they can not deport 12 million illegals! We` probably need to vote all of them out of office and send them back to school to learn history! We pay more to illegals in welfare than it would cost to deport them! Our career politicians need to work for the voters and the good of the United States of America , not the lobbyist and big business.
HOOVER , TRUMAN AND EISENHOWER Here is something that should be of great interest for you to pass around. I didn't know of this until it was pointed out to me. But, back during The Great Depression, President Herbert Hoover ordered the deportation of ALL illegal aliens in order to make jobs available to American citizens that desperately needed work. Harry Truman deported over two million Illegal's after WWII to create jobs for returning veterans. And then again in 1954, President Dwight Eisenhower deported 4 million Mexican nationals! The program was called 'Operation Wetback' so that American WWII and Korean veterans had a better chance at jobs. It took 2 Years, but they deported them! Now, if they could deport the illegals back then, they can sure do it today!!
If you have doubts about the veracity of this information, enter Operation Wetback into your favorite search engine and confirm it for yourself.
Reminder. Don't forget to pay your taxes... 12 million Illegal Aliens are depending on` you.
TV
I've often considered the unrealistic worldview created by TV and movies and what do you know, I read something the other day that was spot on. So, I will quote directly from Kerry Patterson of VitalSmarts:
". . .TV is no better. It often teaches us that the good life consists of sitting around with friends, flirting and playing—and nobody has to work very much in order to afford outlandishly upscale New York apartments. Plus by using their magical clocks, the main characters are able to spend all of their perceivable time goofing off with their friends, yet somehow still have time to meet people and have amazingly active and glamorous dating lives as well as successful careers. How does that work? It’s all part of decoupling action from consequence. Selfish and unrealistic lifestyles lead to fun—not the heartache and deprivation that would likely ensue. . . "
When I read this, Friends immediately came to mind!
". . .TV is no better. It often teaches us that the good life consists of sitting around with friends, flirting and playing—and nobody has to work very much in order to afford outlandishly upscale New York apartments. Plus by using their magical clocks, the main characters are able to spend all of their perceivable time goofing off with their friends, yet somehow still have time to meet people and have amazingly active and glamorous dating lives as well as successful careers. How does that work? It’s all part of decoupling action from consequence. Selfish and unrealistic lifestyles lead to fun—not the heartache and deprivation that would likely ensue. . . "
When I read this, Friends immediately came to mind!
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